Inbali Iserles
Children's writer
Inbali Iserles is an award-winning author of children’s books. Her writing is inspired by a love of the natural world and a passion for fantastical stories. Her debut novel, The Tygrine Cat (Walker, 2007), came to her as she leafed through an encyclopaedia of cat breeds. She began to ponder the idea of a rivalry between ancient feline tribes. The book won the Calderdale Children’s Book of the Year award 2008. Along with its sequel, The Tygrine Cat: On the Run (Walker, 2011), it was one of the Independent’s ‘50 books every child should read.’ A fascination with urban foxes inspired Inbali’s bestselling Foxcraft series (Scholastic, 2015). The fox of folklore was cunning, selfish and untrustworthy. Inbali was keen to right old wrongs — to cast the fox as the hero at last.
Inbali has also written for the New York Times bestselling Survivors series under the pseudonym Erin Hunter. She has penned articles and reviews for a range of publications including the Guardian, the Independent on Sunday and Mslexia. Until leaving to write full-time, she practised as a lawyer at a leading London firm. One of the highlights of her job was editing departmental publications. While the world of children’s fantasy fiction may have little in common with law, both require sensitivity to language.
Inbali was born in Jerusalem, Israel and moved to the UK when she was three years old. She now lives with her family in Cambridge, where she is an active member of the local writing community.
Inbali Iserles is an award-winning author of children’s books. A fascination with urban foxes inspired her popular Foxcraft trilogy, which has been translated into multiple languages. Inbali has written for the New York Times bestselling Survivors series under the pseudonym Erin Hunter. She also writes non-fiction books for younger readers on subjects as diverse as undersea volcanoes and the domestication of cats. She has penned articles and reviews for a range of publications including the Guardian, the Independent on Sunday and Mslexia. She was a writing fellow of the Royal Literary Fund at the Department of Earth Sciences, the University of Cambridge, from 2020 to 2022.